Foundations of College Writing – From Topic to Problem/Question
Below are guidelines for changing an issue/event/person to a problem or question about which you can make an argument.
Possible Topic
What Others Have Said
Problems/Questions
What I Can Add to the Conversation
Example: The war on drugs
Drug abusers continue to fill our courts, hospitals, and prisons. The drug trade causes violent crime that ravages our neighborhoods. Children of drug abusers are neglected, abused, and even abandoned. The only beneficiaries of this war are organized crime members and drug dealers.
Why is the war on drugs such a problem?
Is the war on drugs ever going to be stopped?
History of the war on drugs. Give good support with facts about how long and how much money we have spent to prevent the war on drugs.
Talk about the importance of stopping the war on drugs. Show the amount of people the war on drugs has impacted.
The War on Drugs Impact
In 1971 President Richard Nixon declared war on drugs. He proclaimed, “America’s public enemy number one in the United States is drug abuse. In order to fight and defeat this enemy, it is necessary to wage a new, all-out offensive
Nixon fought drug abuse on both the supply and demand fronts. Nixon’s drug policies reflect both the temperance view and disease view of addiction.
If Drug Abuse only happens every now and then, what’s the big deal?
Should America spend less time on the war on drugs?
If the government wasn’t so strict how would it impact us in the future?
Why is it so big and brought to the media so much?
Talk about how much the war on drugs has changed in the past couple decades. Also talk about the length of trying to stop this war on drugs.
Show now and in the past and compare how things have progressed or declined.
Foundations of College Writing – From Topic to Problem/Question
Below are guidelines for changing an issue/event/person to a problem or question about which you can make an argument.
Is the war on drugs ever going to be stopped?
Talk about the importance of stopping the war on drugs. Show the amount of people the war on drugs has impacted.
Nixon fought drug abuse on both the supply and demand fronts. Nixon’s drug policies reflect both the temperance view and disease view of addiction.
If Drug Abuse only happens every now and then, what’s the big deal?
If the government wasn’t so strict how would it impact us in the future?
Why is it so big and brought to the media so much?
Show now and in the past and compare how things have progressed or declined.